My Invented Life (7 page)

“Hi,” I say.

He scoots away from me like I’m depleted uranium.

“My father was no prostitute,” I say.

He cleans his fingernails with the blade of a small pocketknife.

I bottom crawl two yards in his direction. “Did you do theater at your high school in Bakersfield?”

He stabs the blade in the grass between us. “I told you to stay away,” he says.

Coming from him, the gesture doesn’t seem particularly threatening. I take some nail polish from my bag and touch up a few chips to prove that I’m not the backing-down type. As I blow on my fingertips, BlueDragon ambles over, wagging both head and tail. A gentle elbow to the ribs keeps him from jumping into my lap. Jonathan scowls at me. Obviously he’s never experienced the trauma of dog hair in wet nail polish. When BlueDragon curls up next to Jonathan, I leave.

I dash over to the theater after my last class. Still no playbill, but there’s a note tacked to the Barn door:

Greetings, aspiring thespians,
I will post roles tomorrow morning.
First rehearsal tomorrow after school.
Thank you for your patience,
Sapphire
P.S. Carmen and Roz, please come see me today
at 3:30
.

I look at my watch. That’s in five minutes. Bryan skids to a stop behind me and props his skateboard against the wall. I ignore him until he grabs me around the waist and lifts me off the ground. “You don’t like boys anymore, huh?” he breathes into my ear.

“I didn’t say that.” We stare at each other.

His eyes are a little too close together for perfection, but who cares? It gives his face character. And it won’t
interfere with his future as an underwear model. Before anything happens Oak-Tree Nico, Eyeliner Andie, and another girl who acts like Mandy Moore come around the corner. Bryan puts me down—the wimp.

Mandy Wannabe comes right up to me and pumps my hand. “It’s so cool that you’re, you know, out in the open,” she says.

“There’s plenty more where I came from,” I say, launching my program to eradicate ignorance. “Ten percent of people are GLBT.”

“Geebee what?”

“Gay, lesbian, bisexual, or transgender,” I say.

Mandy Wannabe lets go of my hand. “Whatever.”

Eyeliner Andie has her arms twined around Nico’s waist in a girlfriendy sort of way. This casts some doubt on her alleged lesbian status.

Bryan points his chin at Sapphire’s note. “What’s that all about?”

I shrug. “I guess I’ll go in and find out.”

Sapphire is at her desk munching on a Greek sandwich, two braids coiled into buns over her ears. I leave the door open like she tells me to. “What’s up?”

“We’ll see. Carmen requested a meeting.”

Just then Ms. Strumpet herself strolls in wearing a skintight top zipped low to reveal cleavage, a miracle of Wonderbra enhancement. I run my palm across my hair spikes.

Sapphire throws her gyro wrapper into the waste bin. “Sit down, girls,” she says with unfamiliar gravity.

“I came to rectify an iniquitous injustice,” Carmen huffs.

“Come again?” Sapphire says.

“The audition wasn’t fair because
someone
,” Carmen rolls her eyes in my direction when she says this, “messed with my script. I demand a second chance to read for Rosalind.”

So. Despite their fight, Eva told Carmen about Sapphire’s phone call. The room fades to gray and breaks into dots. I’m hyperventilating again. I hold my breath until the world bursts into color.

“You’re right, Carmen,” Sapphire says. “And though Roz read beautifully, I have no choice but to give you the role. You’re prettier than her. Petite, too.”

Welcome to Roz Nightmare Land
.

Fortunately, nothing of the kind happens. Sapphire lets Carmen finish her screed on fairness—which goes on far too long, if you ask me—before saying a word.

“You read well, Carmen,” she says at last. “Very well. But Roz has blossomed this year. I want to give her a chance this time.”

Carmen jumps out of her seat. “This is my last opportunity to be the lead. I’m a senior. Roz can try again next year.” She’s annoying, and not just because she can French-braid her own hair.

“You can try again in college,” I say.

“It wouldn’t be the same without Sapphire’s superb directing.”

Unchin-snouted foot-licker
. Sadly, Sapphire doesn’t approve of epithets. So although this one is brilliant, I keep it to myself.

“Girls.” Sapphire stretches her arms wide. “You both have long and successful lives ahead of you. This is just one play out of many.”

She is so wrong.

Crocodile tears slide down Carmen’s cheeks. That girl will stop at nothing to win. Still, I can’t help but admire her skill.

“It’s my mom,” she says. “She believes that cheerleading and drama are interfering with my schoolwork. She said that if I don’t get the lead, I have to drop out of the play.”

Ouch. Poor Carmen. I mean it sincerely. I’d rather die a painful death than quit drama. If Mom made demands like that, I’d be forced to sneak around behind her back. More than I usually do.

Sapphire hands Carmen a tissue. “You’ll get a good role in the play. I can talk to your mom, if you like. Tell her the play will be a flop without you.”

“She’s not stupid. Just because she didn’t graduate from high school.”

That’s weird. Carmen often brags about her mom’s meteoric rise in high tech. She emigrated from Mexico as a teenager and now works as a software engineer for a major computer company. She must be a poster child for night school.

“We’ll think of something,” Sapphire says.

When Eva the Diva comes home after cheerleading practice, I drag her into my room before she can lock herself in hers. I close the door behind us. She refuses to sit down even after I’ve dumped the stuff from my chair onto the floor. Instead she stands in the middle of my rug with her arms crossed. I feel like a fisherman that’s just reeled in a moray eel by mistake. But it’s too late to throw her back.

“Are you trying to piss me off? Is that why you’re pulling this stunt?”

Not exactly. I’m doing it because you dumped me. Because Bryan chose you. Because you dared me to
.

“I’m just having fun,” I say.

“The great activist and champion of causes,” she says, “trivializing gays. For fun.”

I need a cogent response. “Am not,” I say.

Logical arguments are not my forte, especially when I do something I can’t explain. She opens my door and makes as if to leave.

“Today wasn’t easy for me,” I say.

She hesitates, her hand still on the doorknob. “Oh yeah?”

“None of my friends hugged me, not even once.” We theater geeks touch a lot—hug, polka around the room, and smoosh cheeks together for pictures.

She shuts the door again and looks at me curiously. Maybe I’ve turned into a species of arachnid with multiple heads.

“They probably thought I would fondle their breasts,” I say.

“You could come clean,” she says.

“What if no one believes me?” This doesn’t seem like the right time to mention that I’m enjoying the role. Just a little.

“I have an idea.” Her eyes glitter with mischief like the old Eva. “Tell everyone that when you were making out with your girlfriend you made a discovery.”

I rise to the bait. “What did I discover?”

“Your girlfriend is actually a boy who dresses like a girl. For fun. So you’re hetero after all.”

I crack up because she’s being the old Eva and it feels good. She starts laughing too, but stops so suddenly that I have to wonder if she made a pact with herself never to giggle with me again.

“Just tell the truth,” she says in a hard voice.

“Forget it,” I say. “I’m not a coward like you.”

I feel a déjà vu coming on, at least that’s what Sierra would call it. Once Eva and I dyed our hair blue for a football game. Afterward she freaked and washed her hair for two hours straight. We missed the game. She wanted me to wash mine out too before Mom got home, but I said no. I told her I wasn’t a coward like her. The shiner she gave me that day matched my hair perfectly.

This time she exits my room like I don’t exist. I prefer her fists to her silence.

T
hursday morning
before the first bell, the theater geeks—minus Eva—gather in front of the Barn waiting for the long-anticipated playbill. Carmen bumps my shoulder hard like I’m in her way. Lately she’s the pimple on the butt of my life. I move over to a spot near Andie where I can study her eyeliner. She has thick lines of indigo around her eyes, and she brushed her lids with two shades of gold. She could be an Egyptian goddess. Note to self: Buy makeup after school.

Jonathan stands apart from the crowd. “Hi,” I say to Andie. “Let’s go talk to the new guy.”

“Let’s not,” she says.

I drag her over anyway so she can be my shield. “Meet Eyeliner Andie. She’s my twin sister,” I say. Jonathan looks confused. “Fraternal twins.” I turn to Andie. “Did you know that Jonathan hosts his own MTV show?”

He doesn’t run away from me this time, and I am grateful.

“Don’t look so worried,” Andie says, shifting into rare social-butterfly mode, though her ripped jeans say more wind-battered moth. “Roz always acts like this.”

I take offense. Andie barely knows me.

“I hear you’re into music,” she says to him.

“I do a little guitar.”

Within seconds, they’re gabbing like old friends. Worse still, they don’t include me in their conversation. Before I figure out what to do next, Sapphire emerges from the Barn. The throng falls silent. She passes around a box of tissues.

“Take one just in case,” she says. “And be nice.”

She tapes the playbill to the door, and we all rush in to look. Seeing my name at the top of the list in black and white fills my heart with whipped cream. It’s official. Before I can do a victory dance, I notice Carmen’s tragic face. Two puddles of black sludge are forming under her eyes. Despite the butt pimple thing, I feel sorry for her.

“You should’ve gotten the lead,” I say. The insides of my cheeks stick to my teeth when I lie. I sling my arm around her shoulders to show I care. She shakes me off.

“It’s just an arm,” I say. “Not a python.”

She smears the wet mascara around her face and joins the group paying homage to Bryan. I follow her. He got the lead, Orlando, who happens to be Rosalind’s love interest in the play. Could life get any more perfect?

“I’ll bet Eva won’t like it when she finds out you have to kiss Roz,” Mandy Wannabe says to Bryan. “In the play, I mean.”

“Kissing a dyke doesn’t count,” he says.

Life has a way of flushing perfection down the toilet. I stuff down the upwelling of tears. Eight years ago, my psychology-impaired swim instructor told me I looked ugly when I cried.

“I don’t believe in dykes,” I say. No one laughs.

“I have a brilliant idea,” Carmen twitters like a bird on caffeine. “Roz can play Rosalind as a man, and I’ll play Rosalind as a woman.” She adjusts her sweater to reveal more skin.

“Ooh la la,” Bryan says. He sweeps up Carmen in the classic Hollywood style to kiss her.

Another incident written and produced by Personal Nightmare, Inc
.

What really happens? Nothing. When Carmen offers to play Rosalind as a woman and bats her sludgy eyelashes at Bryan, he turns away from her. Here are the facts. Carmen looks good, even with mascara waterfalls running down her face. Bryan loves to flirt. Eva is conveniently absent. So his indifference surprises me. I’m delighted, of course, but confused. We disperse without further ado.

When the lunch minute rolls around, I consider where to go. Theater-geek central seems a less appealing option after Bryan’s dyke comment. So I bravely dive into the cafeteria. While in the slop line, I use my peripheral vision to scout for a table that is far, far away from where Eva and her cheerleader lovelies are on display. The cafeteria lady taps her tongs against the vat of shriveled chicken wings to get my attention.

“Oh, frog legs,” I exclaim. “My favorite. Do they come with a portobello Cabernet sauce?”

The boy in line behind me gets it, but the server’s face doesn’t change. Years of standing over bad-smelling steam would dull my funny bone too.

“Aren’t you required to serve a vegetarian option?” I ask.

“My name is Clara, and I will be your waitress this afternoon. Would you care to try our potato and chard soup with pesto garnish?” She adjusts the white cloth hanging over her arm.

If only. My five-star fantasy makes my stomach growl
.

“This is vegetarian.” She taps a bin containing the skeletal remains of green beans.

“I’d like to lodge a complaint,” I say.

She cracks a smile at last, but the flavor is more horror flick than comedy. She gestures me to the kitchen behind her. “Ask for Felicia,” she says.

Felicia is a full twelve inches shorter than me and exudes the authority of a turbocharged pit bull. A pretty pit bull, despite the plastic bag over her hair, the rubber gloves, and full-length apron. I try the mannerly approach.

“Are you Felicia?”

“Yes.” Her look says:
Now you know. Shove off. You’re in my way
.

Luckily I own a fake thick skin to wear over my thin one. “I’m Roz. Pleased to meet you.” I offer my hand in a friendly way. She looks at it like something I fished from the garbage. “I understand you’re very busy. Still, I was wondering. Would it be too much to ask for a vegetarian main course?”

“Try the salad.”

I’m making headway. She’s gone from one-word answers to three-word answers.

“A person could starve on salad alone.”

“Maria!” she yells. “More rolls.” After she barks a few more orders, she looks me up and down. Her eyes gleam
with what I take to be admiration for my persistence, plus a hint of amusement. “Okay. Feeding all you hungry kids is a lot of work. If you volunteer to work here, I’ll think about it.”

“Deal,” I say.

The way the other women in the kitchen laugh at this is a bit concerning.

I’m three minutes late for rehearsal. The few stragglers in front of the Barn fall silent when they see me. An unattractive pair of boxer shorts—plaid and XXL—flaps in the breeze over the door. A poster board underneath reads R
O
Z’
S SKIVVIE
Z. I walk past my so-called undergarment as if it were a silken banner proclaiming L
ONG LIVE
P
RINCESS
R
O
Z.